Forever
by singsongsung
Summary: Nate, Blair, Serena. The avoidance, the emails, the whatcouldhavebeens.


Forever

A/N: So, my first Gossip Girl fic. Inspired by the prequel "It Had to be You", so there are teeny, tiny semi-spoilers, but you don't really need any background to read this. Just to let you know, I've only read the prequel and watched the show, so don't think I'm crazy if I don't adhere to any storylines in the books. This is in the future, which I'm sure you can tell.

For those of you who were waiting for a Gilmore Girls fic, I'm sorry. Hopefully my writer's block with disappear soon. Review, pretty please. Read on!

"Honey!" Her voice, clear and sweet, like church bells on a wedding day, rings through their Upper East Side penthouse apartment. Nate listens carefully, hears the soft _thump_ as she drops her purse on the floor. Her heels click precisely as she walks through the apartment, toward him, and Nate feels his chest tighten, as if he's been caught doing something impossibly wrong. "I'm home!" she continues.

_Honey, I'm home_. If they'd really been in love, if it was all for real, it wouldn't have been such an ugly cliché.

"Nate! Where are you, baby?"

He clears his throat, downs the rest of his scotch. "Bedroom!" he calls gruffly, looking around quickly to make sure there's no weed in sight.

Her smile is polished but genuine. "I'm so glad to see you," she murmurs as she leans down, kissing him heatedly. He pulls away after counting slowly to seventeen. He meant to get to twenty, but he didn't have the patience. He rubs his eyes wearily to prevent looking into hers.

She runs her long fingers through his hair, her fingernails ever-so-slightly scratching his scalp. She makes a small, sympathetic humming sound. "You look so tired, baby. Me, too." She collapsed into his chair with him, half on his lap, half not. "We never have time to do anything together anymore, you know?"

He nods, as noncommittal as possible, but that doesn't deter her. And has it ever? This was the kind of girl who'd known, almost all her life, that she intended to marry Nate Archibald. Who'd been in love with him back in kindergarten when Nate hated spelling but thought colouring was okay. Nate had thought it over many, many times, and he now realizes that no matter what he does, she will always take him back. Even if she can't bring herself to forgive him, she'll take him back. Because to her, he is everything, and she cannot live without him.

Oh, no. That doesn't make him feel guilty at all.

But truthfully, honestly, it does not. Because it's out of his hands. She's in control, and she says: We are married, we are in love, we are perfect.

And she believes it, because she's made herself believe it, and he can hear it in her voice as she says: "Come on, baby, don't look so sad! Let's go out tonight, somewhere wonderful. And when we come home…" she arches her eyebrows and smiles suggestively.

The fact that he is always busy, that they haven't had sex in at least two weeks, does not seem to matter to her. She looks at him expectantly. She sings his praises all the time, and, understandably, she wants a response. An _of course, sounds perfect, where do you want to go? God, you're so beautiful…why don't we just stay in?_

But he can't give her that, he doesn't give her that, because while he never makes an effort, he's sworn to himself that he at least won't lead her on, won't lie to her.

"I…I'd love to, but I have all this stuff I really need to do…work's been so hectic lately."

"Oh, come on," she purrs. "It has been for me, too. Let's go on a date tonight. Let me dress up," she adds. "And you can wear that new sweater I got you. I have a skirt that'll match. Coordination's a lot more important than you think," she adds teasingly.

"I really can't," he replies, getting up without warning so that she sort of topples into the chair. "I have…a lot to do."

"Nate!" she calls after him as he leaves the room. They've been married for two years, and despite the uneasy, quasi-guilty feeling welling in his chest, he can't help but hope that she's finally getting annoyed.

She follows him into the massive closet and stares blatantly as he slips off his slacks and on a pair of sweats. Sweats. He can practically_feel_ her cringing.

"Nate," she says softly, delicately, resting her hand on the sleeve of one of his blazers. "I wanted to talk to you about something important tonight."

"Yeah?"

"Yes," she says firmly, and he sees that stubbornness, the same emotion that's keeping her from realizing how badly he wants out of all this. "Are you still saying no?"

He clenches his jaw. "I have work to do, okay?"

"Fine," she retorts, eyes swimming with something close to, but not quite, tears. "We'll talk about it now, then."

Surprised, he shrugs, "Okay."

She studies her collection of Jimmy Choos idly. "I think…don't you think it's time we started to try?"

He blinks at her, staring blankly. That's not what he'd been expecting, and he doesn't know what she means. "Try what?" he asks, wondering _Bungee jumping? Playing chess? Taking over the world? Something equally ridiculous, like actually being honest with each other?_

She rolls her eyes and smiles a little, as shy as he'll ever see her. "For a _baby_."

His eyes all but fall out of their sockets as he gapes at her. "A_baby_?" he repeats incredulous. Is she insane? She wants to bring a kid into this awkward hell? He doesn't want that. It's not what he wants. "I…no."

"What?" she snaps. "You can't just say no like that! God, Nate…this…is…it's a sensitive thing. I think we're ready to have kids."

"I don't," he replies simply.

"And why the fuck not?" she retorts, actual tears threatening to surface.

"We're not ready for that. We're so not ready for that," he says, thinking desperately about what else would sound reasonable.

"I am, and I have to do the hard part," she contradicts, confident in her argument.

"What the hell? No! If we had a kid…which we're not…I want to do stuff right! You remember, you know, how fucked up everything was for us. You want that for our kid? We can't have a kid!"

She looks at the floor as she asks, "Would we have ever found each other if everything hadn't been so…fucked?"

"Fuck," is all he mutters.

She laughs softly, and he can't help but smile easier. He does love her, just not the way she wants it. "I didn't mean to freak you out like that. We don't have to start trying this second but…soon?" she asks hopefully.

"No," he says again. "No."

"But-"

"Blair, think it over and you'll realize how crazy you sound. I'm going into my office. Don't know how late it'll be." He pulls his old green sweater on and walked out.

* * *

In his office, his safe haven, he pulls off the sweater and stares at that stupid little heart, still sewn on this sleeve. For such a tiny charm, it weighs him down impossibly. Carefully, he places it on the hook on the back on his door, far away from his desk, just so that he can have a little breathing room.

He opens his second drawer. In the midst of financial papers, the kind that Blair, so used to having all the money she could ever need, would never look at because the were mention of them makes her eyes glaze over, he finds what he's looking for.

It's one picture, four by six, printed on matte film at Wal-Mart. Yes, Wal-Mart. It had taken effort for Nate to get there for the very first time in his life, and it was like another world. He'd read the price tag on a shirt six times: $7.50. Seven fifty. Not seventy five, but seven dollars and fifty since. He'd been a little bit like a kid in a candy store, staring around him in wonderment. He'd wanted to buy that shirt for himself, and thought about buying a cheap, faux-diamond watch for Blair. He pictured her laughter and her smile as she opened it and kissed him, and had that strange idea that a crappy-quality watch could save them. It was only then that he realized that he was picturing the wrong girl. Blair would not laugh at a twenty dollar watch. She would scoff, throw it away, turn up her nose, and wonder if we beloved Nathaniel had lost his mind.

That was what drove Nate toward the photo centre. He took the CD out of his pocket, inserted it into a machine, pressed a few buttons, and three minutes and two dollars later, he had an actual tangible printout of the picture he placed so much value on.

It was…why bother even saying it? It was obvious to the world, Blair included, that if Nate had a treasured picture stashed away somewhere, it was of the Upper East Side's "S", the scandalous girl with the perfect body but not-so-perfect life. Serena van der Woodsen, Nate's lifelong friend and very best girl.

She was wearing a dress (designer of some sort; duh). It was yellow, and she had several golden chains around her neck. She was wearing that jubilant smile that Nate so adored, leaning down with her arms wrapped around a blonde-haired, blue-eyed little girl, also dressed in a yellow, expensive, summery dress.

The little girl was not Serena's daughter. When he'd first received the e-mail containing the picture, he'd had what he was sure was a minor heart attack. He had very little communication with Serena, in general. She called sometimes to talk to Blair, but there conversations were truly disguised competitions; Serena would talk of her fabulous life, and Blair, never submitting, never willing to be outdone, would babble joyfully about her _perfect_life as Blair Cornelia Archibald, queen of socialites. Fifteen minutes later, the girls would hang up with a cry of, "Kiss kiss!"

But Serena had maintained her age-old quirky habit of just sending Nate random pictures she thought might make him smile. Shortly after his wedding, it'd been one of Serena, trying on Blair's wedding dress and pretending to be royalty, her smile silly but also a bit dreamy. Blair still didn't know that her best friend has snuck into her thousand-dollar, precious gown; that it had looked less gaudy, less overwhelming when Serena wore it with that smile in her navy blue eyes.

Months later, she sent him a picture of herself on a beach somewhere, a starfish in her hair. Those pictures continued to arrive sporadically: Serena and Lily van der Woodsen lounging in Adirondack chairs, Serena looking much too much like her mother's daughter that one could do nothing but laugh; Serena attempting to do the moonwalk in the middle of a street in Spain; Serena sitting on the steps of Constance Billard, chin in her hands, looking like a high school girl again; Serena pretending to model in front of the Eifel Tower as a French schoolboy gaped at her admiringly in the background.

The one with the little girl had shocked Nate; they looked two perfectly similar. He'd had trouble breathing momentarily. He couldn't bring himself to leave Blair, to pursue Serena, but he couldn't bear the thought of that someone else had gotten the girl of his dreams. He didn't sleep for two nights, simply paced the house, anxious and agitated, as Blair slept peacefully. Finally, two days after the arrival of the picture, at three in the morning, he received another e-mail from Serena:

_That's Eric's little girl. Isn't she fabulously stunning? I love her too much, you know? She's growing so, so fast. She'll be four in two weeks. _

_Don't you sometimes wish there was such a thing as forever? I used to. I still do. Every minute._

_Wish you were here. Too much._

_S._

Nate had read the first sentence twice, and breathed a sigh of relief. So the Serena look-alike was actually her niece. But the rest of the e-mail…he wished that in high school, instead of spending so much time stoned and/or staring at the two beautiful girls he loved, he'd actually paid attention in class so he'd know how to dissect a piece of writing.

Forever? He did wish for it, all the time. Did she mean that she wanted forever with him? That she had in high school, that she still did? And those two words: too much. She was saying that she loved him. He was almost positive of that.

And all he can think is: fuck. That word sums up his life, he figures. His life and Blair's and Serena's. And it was probably all his fault, for messing around with their heads.

He remembers those moments of perfection in his parents' bedroom, fifteen years old, with too much heat and too much feeling but never enough of her.

Fucked.

They (he and Serena) were, they (he and Blair) are, and they (all three of them) will probably always be.

He stares at that photograph so much…_too much_. He imagines that his daughter with Serena, their child, could have looked like that. And he looks at his wedding photo with Blair, framed in silver on his desk, and he wishes he could replace it with the one of the woman he loves and the child that so easily could have been theirs.

He has choices to make…too many. Blair or Serena? Serena or Blair?

But there is one thing that Nathaniel Archibald knows for sure.

Whomever he chooses will undoubtedly reject him.

And then it will be too late to turn to the other.

And to think he used to think about how lucky he was to be best friends with such wonderful girls. The naïveté. The stupidity. The innocence. And the heartbreak.

He finds himself staring at his green heart-sleeve sweater, at the picture filled with yellow, the gold of dresses and the blonde of hair.

He wishes for the antithesis of what his life is right now: fucked.

And that seems a lot like it would be forever.

A/N: I love reviews. ;)


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